Grouse Season

By Doug Larsen, Contributing Writer

Opening day of grouse season isn’t like any other hunting opener, not at all. It isn’t duck season, when we sync our watches to the nuclear clock—so at the instant the season opens, we go guns hot. It isn’t deer season, when we must squeeze the truck door closed and ghost into the field under cover of darkness, silent and scentless. It’s not the pheasant opener either—when trucks burst with orange-clad hunters, and dogs of all shapes and sizes push rows of corn.

Grouse opener is serious, but casual. It’s a little secretive, and often solitary. In the grouse woods you can feel as if you may be alone on the planet, just a man in an endless wood. And that is a feeling that is harder and harder to come by on our busy planet. All grouse hunting ideally requires are a dog that checks in with you, land you can walk, a gun you can carry for a while … and a while. There is no reason to check your watch, no reason to hurry. You may want to wait until the dew is off the ground, and it’s smart to wait until the birds have woken up a bit and spread some scent around. The briars will still tug at you later in the morning, but they won’t be so wet.

There are so many things to love about grouse hunting; yellow, spade-shaped poplar leaves, the musty peat smell of the woods in autumn, the view down a seemingly endless logging road, hunting the edges or sharing a sandwich with the dog on the tailgate. Later in the season, but not too late, the leaves are down, and there is just enough snow so that you’ll see grouse tracks. You can study the pattern made by bird feet, and you may see where the bird hopped up on a deadfall, or into a high bush cranberry, and you’ll think about how the grouse spends his day. You hope that how he spends his day will intersect with how you are spending yours, and you trust the dog to arrange the meeting. It’s all good stuff, and every time I think about my best grouse hunts, I find that I just stare off into space and sigh. Good bird hunting should elicit that response. Grouse hunting isn’t a high-fiving kind of pursuit; it’s meant to make you sigh with content. So much has to go right to make a good ruffed grouse hunting memory that it seems an appropriate reaction.

If your goal was to kill birds, you could do it from a treestand with a pellet gun. But done just right, you’d follow a flashy little dog with a good bit of white on him. He’d work scent until he was just close enough, then he’d start to tiptoe like he was on a freshly mopped floor, and his head would be high as his nose searched for clues. When he was sure—very sure—he would slide into a point from a good distance away. His body might be angled away from the bird, but his tail would be higher now too, and his head and nose would help point you to the direction of the bird. You’d watch your step and make sure of your footing as you nimbly shoulder your way through aspens the size of front yard flagpoles, and about the time the bird was away, you’d mount the gun and swing it through something akin to a closet full of hockey sticks and rake handles. Luckily, after the shot there’s just a feather or two in the air, and the woods would go quiet as you ask your dog to “hunt dead.” Shortly, there’s a russet, or perhaps a gray bird, plump in your gloved hand, and you celebrate with a wry smile … and a sigh.

Tips to Take to the Bank

by Mike Hanback

Field Editor

What's the best rut sign?

Look for rubs and lots of them. Scientists say a property with a good number of mature bucks can have 10 times as many rubs as a spot with few bucks that are 3.5 years and older.

Scientific studies show

and check for does where narrow fingers of timber or brush intersect, says top whitetail biologist Mickey Hellickson, after analyzing thousands of trail-cam images of Iowa and Texas bucks. Now you know where to hang some stands.

Your midday hunting

will be best from the 21st to the 24th, before the majority of hunters hit the woods on Thanksgiving weekend. There's a funky full moon this month—not until November 21. I expect bucks to rut some at midday, but not as much as they would had the moon waxed full earlier in the month. Come the 21st, bowhunters have been in the woods for a good six weeks, and guns have started booming in some states. I believe this pressure overrides the moon's effects and turns bucks secretive and nocturnal.

The new Ram Tradesman Could this be the year of the work truck? If so, the Ram Tradesman is ready to clock in. Equipped with a juiced-up HEMI® engine and standard Class IV trailer hitch with 9,100-lb towing capacity, it's a tricked-out tool that's anything but standard for under $22K.**

The new Ram 1500 Express Hear the growl of the standard, proven 5.7L Hemi® V8 that offers 20 hwy mpg* and kicks out 390 hp. With 20" aluminum wheels and integrated dual exhaust, you won't find a better deal on a V8-powered sport truck anywhere else. This is the new Ram 1500 Express. Your truck. Your terms. Check it out at ramzone.com. .

Like the fossilized skeletons of its ancestors displayed in the Smithsonian, a 12-foot alligator can be scary even when it's dead—something that Shooting Illustrated's Adam Heggenstaller learned in person during a gator hunt in Florida. Read More »